About four moths from the Lok Sabha elections next year, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems be getting the whiffs of prospect in South India with 11 seats in Telangana leaning on the saffron side as counting crossed mid-way on December 3.
This marks a steep surge from just one seat the party had bagged with a vote share of 6.98 percent in the 2018 Assembly polls. Although the state this time seems set to offer a sweeping victory to the Congress, the BJP smells fresh opportunity that can be unleashed in future. The rise in the tally clearly shows how the party learnt from its mistakes in the Karnataka polls earlier this year.
Political experts pointed out that despite the debacle in the state polls, the BJP had won four Lok Sabha constituencies with a notable 19.5 percent share of the electorate. With a far higher number of Assembly seats painted saffron this time, the party will be able to improve its tally in the general elections as well, according to the experts.
The BJP is not in power in any of the states on the south of the Vindhyas, but it threw its hat into the ring not as a front-runner, but as a move towards becoming a relevant political choice. And, it has worked, it seems.
To gain traction on the ground, the party fielded three of its four Lok Sabha members, including Bandi Sanjay Kumar who was the former Telangana BJP chief and Karimnagar MP, Nizamabad MP Dharmapuri Arvind, and Adilabad MP Soyam Bapu Rao who had contested from the reserved constituency of Boath.
The BJP also remained a force in the state under the leadership of Bandi Sanjay Kumar until he was replaced by Union tourism minister G Kishan Reddy.
In the 2018 polls, the BRS, formerly known as Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), was a dominant force with 88 seats in its fold. The Congress had come second with 19 seats, while AIMIM had secured seven seats and the BJP just one.
The BJP entered the polls in 2023 promising a chief minister from the backward classes and conceding to sub-categorisation of the Scheduled Castes. “Congress versus BJP in Telangana in 2024 Lok Sabha polls is a good news for the party as we will emerge victorious in a direct fight with Congress,” party veteran GVL Narasimha Rao said.
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